


Of Destiny and Choice

by thelordofstarsanddreams



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bonding, Casual Sex, Choices, F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff and Angst, Love Confessions, Mating Bond, Post-War, Relationship(s), Rough Sex, Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-07
Updated: 2016-12-07
Packaged: 2018-09-07 05:06:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8784286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelordofstarsanddreams/pseuds/thelordofstarsanddreams
Summary: It had all began shortly after they returned from Hybern.
Well, technically, it had started when Nesta and Cassian had first met each other, when the Illyrians and Feyre had crossed the wall and into the Archeron estate.
A clash of violent tempers and conflicting personalities had seemed like little to nothing back then. That one encounter with Nesta in her bedroom before she drove a knee into his most favorite part had added fuel to the flames.
Yet it wasn’t until Nesta and Elaine had been reborn, Feyre had returned to the Spring Court and Cassian had been left with his wings devastated, that something shifted.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Another prompt from Tumblr, this one took me a long time to write, but I got the inspiration in the past few days and I just ran with it. Thus this fic was born. It was a lot longer than was intended but hopefully, it's a lot of quality and you guys enjoy it. Leave me a kudos or a comment, let me know what you think. Means the world.

It had all began shortly after they returned from Hybern.

Well, technically, it had started when Nesta and Cassian had first met each other, when the Illyrians and Feyre had crossed the wall and into the Archeron estate.

A clash of violent tempers and conflicting personalities had seemed like little to nothing back then. That one encounter with Nesta in her bedroom before she drove a knee into his most favorite part had added fuel to the flames.

Yet it wasn’t until Nesta and Elaine had been reborn, Feyre had returned to the Spring Court and Cassian had been left with his wings devastated, that something shifted.

Even with Amren’s help, and the healer’s skill, the damage to Cassian’s wings had been…extensive. Shredded skin, muscles, nerves. Though they clotted and healed what they could, it would take time, and even then, they couldn’t guarantee that he would fly again. And that had almost been enough to break Cassian in itself.

What an Illyrian without wings?

What use was he if he couldn’t fly? Couldn’t command from the skies? Defend his home?

They all tried.

Rhysand had enough on his plate. With a mounting war and his mate in the middle of enemy territory, he could see the agony in his friend’s face every day.

Azriel had been rendered weak by the ash bolt and poison, yet the man had spent more time by Cassian’s bed side than anyone else. Trying to tempt him into going outside, into training, fighting even just losing his temper. Anything other than being lost. Even when he brought Morrigan along, neither of them could solicit much of a reaction from their friend and brother.

The man shut himself away, only accepting the help to re-bandage his wings, unable to look at them himself.

It was only when Nesta had visited him for the first time had he reacted in any way.

Mor had taken the sisters to the mountain cabin. Somewhere safe, and where they could take the time to adjust to what had happened, to their new bodies, but eventually, Nesta had demanded they both be brought out of solitude, and so they had come to stay in a town house next to Rhys’ in Velaris.

Nesta hadn’t seen the man since they’d left Hybern and he’d been bloody and broken. Those glorious wings in shreds. And when she visited him, it was like standing in front of a different person. Cassian seemed…empty. Lost. Yet she had not been willing to coddle him.

The woman had confronted him, spoken to him as she always had. Had hissed and baited him, wanting to see that same defiant challenge she remembered the day he’d first come to their manor.

There had been nothing.

On the second visit, Cassian had growled at her.

On the third, he’d snarled and physically thrown her out of the room.

Despite the lack of welcoming reaction to her, it had still been a reaction, which was more than any of them had gotten in weeks. Nesta still had the ability to get under his skin. And so she made it a routine. To visit him each day. Even if she got thrown out within ten minutes of being there. It meant that he felt something. Even if it was raw anger.

Cassian had barely given himself time to heal before he first tried to fly again, throwing himself off a balcony and unsurprisingly hitting the ground when his wings wouldn’t hold him. Nesta had screamed at him from his spot on the street below, not caring who watched as she scolded him, shoving the popped bone of his shoulder back into place, before slapping him and leaving.

The woman didn’t return for a few days after that.

However, this time, Cassian came to her. Visting the building just a little down the street, his first time out of the town house in weeks.

Elaine had found herself a small shop within the heart of Verlaris, a florist who was happy to have her spend hours arranging bouquets and tending to flowers. It kept the woman occupied, which meant it was easier to forget about what had happened, about what she was. It was how Elaine had learned to cope.

That particular afternoon, Nesta and Cassian found their own way to cope.

There was nothing gentle about that first time together. There were no soft whispers, or fleeting touches. It was rough, desperate, filled with anger and pain. It was nails and teeth, and collapsing together when they were both exhausted and sore.

Each of them had their own hurt, things that bubbled furiously within their hearts, and sex was a release, a distraction.

That was their relationship for the longest time. Afternoons filled with hungry, angry sex. They broke furniture, knocked paintings off the wall, and during one particular violent orgasm, Nesta literally set the headboard on fire. The wood had turned to embers under her palms and as she’d climaxed the wood had set alight beneath her touch, the flames that had smoldered in her blood finding release as she did.

Cassian had laughed at the smoke filled room, his first real laugh in longer than he could remember.

Nesta had been horrified. Yet it was enough to bring her to terms with what bubbled within her.

Within a week, she was in the House of Wind, training with Cassian, whose wings were still strapped to his back with thick bandages, but who with her insistence, had refused to grow any weaker. If war was coming, which they knew it was, he’d fight, even if it was on foot.

The Archeron sister took to fighting better than expected. Nesta had so much anger and with her new fae body it translated into strength. Control was the issue, and converting it into skill. Rhysand trained with her while he could, helping her to work out what exactly she’d been given the day she’d been put into the Cauldron and born a new. Cassian however, showed her how to throw a punch, to wield a blade, showed her how to grow strong and fast, while building on his own lessened strength.

Nesta’s power was different from Feyre’s, whose fire crackled under her skin, always caressing and waiting. She was an inferno, a ticking time bomb of flame and ash. As the woman trained and tapped into her own reserves, they found she could burn, a walking torch of embers.

And Cassian found that he’d quite happily crumble to ash if it meant getting to spend just a few moments, lost in the fire that was her.

————————–

The war approached faster than any of them could expect.

When Feyre finally returned to the Spring Court, she had left a wake of destruction behind her, returning to find Nesta even more changed than she had been the moment she had emerged from the Cauldron. And she would go to war, with her own personal vendetta against the King of Hybern, and she would do it while leading a small division of warriors. Female Illyrians. Those whose wings had been clipped but still held the ability to fight.

By day they all trained, planned, prepared themselves along their armies and allies. More often than not, at night, Nesta and Cassian would find themselves in each others beds. Finding it more of a necessity than either could admit.

Bit by bit, Cassia used his wings again. He flew, and Nesta could have wept for him, the day he had taken to the skies again. Yet he didn’t go unaffected. The beautiful expanse of his wings were matted with scars, and struggled to fly long distances without the pain becoming too much. But to fly again? It was more than he could ask for.

The war hit each of them hard.

Battles fought in different lands, in various courts. Often they would be separated. Amren almost always tending to stay in Velaris, to protect and keep the wards up while the other went where they were needed. Some fronts were won, some were lost, yet every one of them was fought with everything they had. And when it came to the eve of the battle they knew would decide their fate against Hybern, there was a heavy sense of end in the air.

They found each other that night, Nesta and Cassian. Sat by each other next to the fire in the war camp, had drifted to Cassian’s tent.

As they’d held each other, naked and exhausted, Cassian had professed his love to her. Quietly spoken into the shell of her ear. The first and only time he’d said the words.

“I love you, Nesta Archeron.”

The woman had been silent, her breathing steady until he was certain she was asleep. But Nesta had heard the words, had let them wrap around her in a tight coil she never knew she could feel.

Love. He loved her.

Nesta was certain she just might love him too.

The words however, never left her.

And in the morning, they went to war.

————————– 

It was brutal, and bloody, lasting almost a week on a war that had been dragging on for months.

They triumphed, with Nesta striking the killing blow to the heart of the King as Feyre had decapitated Jurian. Their armies, their friends, holding back waves of soldiers.

When everything had ended, Prythian had changed. The world had.

The Wall had been destroyed, High Lords, those who had sided with Hybern, were mostly dead or imprisoned. That meant knew Lords, knew order. And Rhysand, the Night Court, they were the heroes, not the villains any longer.

And a couple of months later, when the dust had settled, when treaties had been signed and repairs were being made across the land, for the first time ever, Velaris opened its doors to the world.

It had been a celebration, a party unlike any other, held in the house of wind, for the lords and fae and people of the various Courts, and they had come. People danced, laughed, drank and sang. Nesta had found Cassian, dancing with him as her gown of emerald green swirled around her.

Tonight, she had promised herself, tonight she would speak those words to him that he had told her the night before the great battle. That she loved him too.

Nesta had merely wanted a drink. Had crossed to the table to pour herself a glass of sparkling wine, when she’d been tripped, bumping into another fae. A man with flaming red hair, who had caught her. And when the sister lifted her gaze to apologize, she met those eyes and the world shifted, something snapping into place.

It was like all the breath had been ripped from Nesta, and she found herself unable to look away from this man as he held her, hands warm on either side of her. He smelt like cinnamon and ash.

Mate.

This was what the other had meant when they talked about a mating bond. What Elaine had experienced that moment she’d locked eyes with Lucien. It was the exact same when Nesta now looked at his brother, Prince of the Autumn Court.

It was as if those around them understood. Could sense the bond falling into place.

None more than Cassian, as he watched in horror, practically smelling the connection settle.

Just like that Nesta was taken from him.

The woman only just saw the heartbreak etch across Cassian’s handsome features, before he disappeared, lost to the crowd and then to the night sky.

————————– 

“You don’t have to do this.”

Feyre’s voice was firm as it echoed through Nesta’s room within the town house, watching as her sister moved from the dresser to the case on the bed, packing items as she went.

“He’s my mate, it’s expected of me. Why wouldn’t I go?”

The sound of disgust rattled from Feyre as she rolled her eyes, crossing the room to slam down the lid of the suitcase, causing Nesta to hesitate. “A mating bond isn’t an obligation, and since when have you done what’s expected of you?” Surely her sister knew why she couldn’t go. The main reason being the sulking Illyrian who’d barely shown his face since the celebrations weeks ago. Not to mention, Alon, the youngest Prince of the Autumn Court, wasn’t who’d she have wanted for the woman. He had the same reputation his brothers did, of being cruel and cold when he desired to be.

“You’re happy, you and Rhysand. Elaine and Lucien have settled nicely together, why should I do the same?”

Nesta was as stubborn as ever. Why should she stay? It wasn’t like Cassian had made an attempt to stop her from going to the Autumn Court and officially accepting Alon as he mate. The man hadn’t spoken to her in weeks.

“That’s not the point, Nesta. I told you about Rhys’ parents. A mating bond…it doesn’t always work out. You still have a choice in this.”

“And I’ve made it. The bonding ceremony will be in three days, you’re still invited and I expect you to be there.”

The note of dismissal in Nesta’s voice was evident, and Feyre didn’t argue any further.

She knew more than anyone when a battle was lost against her sister.

————————– 

“They’ve gone to the cabin, with some persuasion. Rhys and Az are going to get him too drunk to think about tonight,” Morrigan stood in the hall of the town house, her soft blue dress billowing around her, falling to her feet in delicate drapes, loose so it allowed room around her expanding stomach.

That had been a surprise for both her and Azriel. Apparently, their time together on the eve of battle had brought them more than good luck towards the victory. When she was younger, and her family had put that nail through her, Mor had been warned that there was a chance that she may never conceive.

Now, not only had her and Azriel finally gotten together, much to everyone’s waiting expectation, but Mor was almost five months pregnant, her stomach rounding and the woman herself glowing. It had taken centuries, an eternity. Yet it had led her here, and she was happy. Happier than she ever could be. So was Azriel, though letting his pregnant partner leave for a bonding ceremony in the Autumn Court hadn’t quite sat right with him.

Mor had been insistent however. Cassian needed his friends, and Feyre needed the support. Plus, it wouldn’t hurt to have the Night Courts presence slightly more known at the event.

“I can’t believe she’s going through with it,” Feyre sighed, fixing a diamond earring into her ear as she checked over her appearance in the mirror, tucking a loose strand of hair against the crown which rested atop of her head.

“Me either.”

A sigh echoed from the two women, as Morrigan extended her hand to Feyre and the High Lady took it and without another word, they winnowed away.

————————– 

The Autumn Court was alive.

It was filled with people, mostly from the land itself, and the few invited guests like the Ladies of the Night Court.

Nesta was clad in various reds and oranges, a gown which swept and trailed across the marble floor. She looked like flame in fae form. Yet her face was unreadable. For what was meant to be the happiest day of her life, she didn’t look particularly thrilled. Feyre wasn’t that surprised. Nesta wasn’t exactly big into broadcasting emotions.

Alon was mingling with those in attendances, and greeted Feyre and Mor when they had arrived. They’d been polite yet short in their conversation. Neither quite welcoming his company.

The Court made Mor nervous, even though Eris was dead as was his father, she couldn’t help but remember what it was to be dumped at the doors of this very palace, left for dead.

The sooner it was over the better.

Everything would build towards the feast, when Nesta was to present the first plate to Alon as an act of accepting the bond before they’d have it verified by a Priestess.

The moment came.

The Court fell silent.

Everyone waited for Nesta to appear from the kitchens with the plate.

And as five minutes uncomfortably dragged into ten, it was evident she wasn’t coming.

————————– 

“The Mother is a bitch with a shit sense of humour.”

Cassian’s growl rattled through the cabin as he angrily filled another glass of potent alcohol, the amber liquid splashing slightly over the side of the glass. Apparently, the Cauldron just wanted to fuck him constantly, and not in a way he enjoyed. First, she destroyed his wings, then she gave him a woman to fall in love with, only to have her be mated to someone else. Hilarious.

The best plan, Rhys and Azriel had believed, was to get Cassian completely smashed until he didn’t have to think about Nesta and what was going on, yet so far, it had been difficult to get him to shut up about her.

“We know, Cas. But it just…wasn’t meant to be,” Rhysand offered, knowing what it was to be mated to someone, to have that bond accepted and the intensity of it, but to fall in love without that. To have his heart smashed. He felt for his friend.

“Fuck that. Fuck everything.”

A knock.

Three heads turned towards the cabin.

“Who-”

Another knock.

Rhysand rose to his feet, crossing the room to open the door as the other males righted themselves, peering towards the door as it opened. There was a low murmur of voices, and the male glanced to his friends. “Azriel, I think we have to go.”

“Is everything alright?” The Shadow Singer looked panicked, but Mor’s voice immediately greeted him from outside, calling to him.

“Everything’s fine, just get out here.”

As if beckoned by a call he couldn’t refuse, Azriel ducked past Rhysand, finding Mor outside, with Feyre, and also alongside them, was Nesta.

The women had winnowed in when they’d found Nesta in the Autumn Court, hiding in a pantry and she’d demanded they take her to wherever Cassian was. Now the plan was to give the pair some much needed privacy as they either fought or fucked until the mountains shook around them.

“Time to go,” Morrigan insisted to her partner, barely hesitating as she stepped into his arms and within a moment they were gone.

Feyre looked to her High Lord, giving him a weak little smile. “Long story, I’ll explain at home,” Rhys smirked, stepped outside of the cabin, casting Nesta a lingering look, before joining his Queen, winnowing away a moment later.

Cassian was more than confused as he stood, watching his two brothers abandon him without thought. “Bastards,” He growled, not sure why they’d left or what was going on, until Nesta stepped into the cabin, slamming the door behind her.

“You,” The woman hissed, and the hair on the back of Cassian’s neck stood to attention. “You prick. You couldn’t just leave me be, leave me to mate like everyone else,” Her words were sharp, spat but they didn’t seem to have the normal viciousness to them.

“The hell are you talking about, I was no where near your stupid party!” Cassian appealed, for once, genuinely not seeing what he had done wrong. She had found her mate, and he had respected that.

“That’s the problem! I haven’t stopped thinking about you! Any man would have been at that damn celebration, stopping me! You are awful at romantic gestures!”

“Nesta, what-”

“No! Don’t talk. You tell me you love me and then you were just willing to let me leave, to go to someone else. You didn’t fight for me! Didn’t even speak to me! What is wrong with you?”

Cassian was speechless. The words lost on his tongue. What the hell did he say? What could he say? In leaving her be, he’d thought he’d been doing the right thing. “I don’t know what to say,” Was all he could manage to splutter out. The warrior who didn’t know when to shut up, was lost for words.

Nesta rolled her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest, giving him a look that would have killed were it not for the embers which burned in that gaze and promised so much more than hatred. “I love you, you infernal idiot.”

Now there was silence between the both of them. Heavy and thick, like the tension which had built from the moment she had entered the cabin.

“You what?”

“I’m not saying it again, Cassian.”

“Please,” Nesta turned her focus to him at that softly spoken plea, his footsteps thudding against the ground as he moved towards her. “Please say it again.”

The woman couldn’t speak, could barely breathe as the Illyrian stopped in front of her, a breath between their bodies and she was reminded of the day he had pressed her against the wall and first trailed his tongue along her neck.

“I love you.”

This time there was no insult jarred onto the end, nothing other than the admission and the soft vulnerability in Nesta’s voice as she laid herself bare to him, letting that guard slip.

Rough fingers cradled her jaw in a delicate touch, lifting her chin towards him as Cassian slid another arm around her waist, pulling her body against his own. Leaning down, their lips met, and he kissed her, softer than he ever had. It was gentle and filled with all the things he’d wanted to say but hadn’t. When he pulled back, he frowned slightly.

“You’re…mate?” He choked on the word, only to see Nesta shake her head, hair falling to frame her strong features.

“I refused the bond, I didn’t go through with it. He’s not my mate. I’ve made my choice.”

The smile which flashed onto Cassian’s lips was one of pure blissful happiness, sweeping her into his arms to clutch her close to him, kissing the side of her head, before setting her back to her feet.

“I love you too, Nesta Archeron.”

That was all it took.

They both decided in that moment that fate and the Mother could go to hell.

They had the right to choose, and they chose each other.

And the mountains trembled beneath them as they made it know.


End file.
